


Ruhāb

by fireweed15



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-21
Updated: 2017-08-21
Packaged: 2018-12-18 03:07:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11865387
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fireweed15/pseuds/fireweed15
Summary: Everyone has something to fear.





	Ruhāb

**Author's Note:**

> [Hassan](https://charahub.com/character/998852/Hassan-Ormara/public/) is the Omnic who works in the store where Tracer tries to buy Emily's scarf in the comic Reflections; [Elías](https://charahub.com/character/1000869/Elas-Jos-Solos/public/) is the Omnic from the Soldier 76 short ([about whom I've written previously](http://archiveofourown.org/works/11809641)).

The flat next door got a new pet.

As a general rule, Hassan didn’t mind his human neighbors' animals—some of the smaller pets he found quite charming. But this—oh no, not this one. That evening, he all but staggered into the flat, hands trembling as he locked and bolted the door.

"What's wrong?" Elías' voice sounded distant, and then terribly close as he touched Hassan's shoulder. "What happened?"

" _Kalb_ —" He struggled for a moment to find the proper word in their common language. "Dog—neighbor's new dog."

"Did it hurt you?" Elías took his hands and tugged him away from the door. " _Ven, ven_ —come." He all but gently pushed him to sit on the low couch. "What happened, Hassan?"

"It—saw me—when I came up the stairs." His grip on Elías' hands tightened sharply. "It's _huge_ , Najm…!"

"Did it hurt you?" he asked, wrapping an arm loosely around Hassan's shoulders. None of his clothes were torn or damaged, so perhaps not, but the fear in his voice, the soft click of a cooling fan as he whipped himself into a deeper and deeper state of fear meant that anything could have happened…

"Not hurt," he mumbled, leaning against his boyfriend's side, into his touch. "Just… dogs like that—"

He stopped, making an apparent conscious effort to calm himself. "During the… before—" There was never a simple, clean cut term for what the humans called the Omnic Crisis, and many of them would simply call it _before_ —"in Ormara, some of us… They're terrible, Najm—even to Omnic, a dog can be a terrible thing—"

"Were you attacked?" Elías asked, his soul twisting at the thought.

"Only a few times." Hassan chuckled without humor, a free hand curling into a tight fist. "I make it sound so simple, but I'm so afraid even after all this time—"

"It's never that simple," Elías mumbled. "Like… me and bats."

Hassan shook his head—Elías' reaction to cricket and baseball bats was one of intense fear… but at the same time—"That's different, my star… It's been years—"

"You have every reason to fear those kind of dogs." He loosely hugged Hassan, not wanting to upset him more. "No one… thinks less of you." After a moment of careful thought, he reached down and gently uncurled Hassan's clenched fist before lacing their fingers together. " _I_ don't think less of you."

Hassan lifted his head to consider Elías before gently drawing him close, the backs of his fingers brushing his cheek. "What did I do to deserve such a beautiful star?" he murmured, their foreheads touching, the Omnic equivalent of a kiss.

From time to time, they could hear the neighbor's dog through the flat's thin walls as they settled in, their frames molded to each other's as they exchanged soft, sweet nothings—but the sound was distant, the worries and fears that accompanied it impossibly far from their minds.


End file.
